Looking for an Opening.....

Four of the five tenants of a Wallingford shopping plaza won't face any sanctions from the town, despite having reopened before they were supposed to after building code officials shut them down last week out of concern about the potential for snow-related roof cave-ins.

The stores - a Sears, Radio Shack, Petco and Hallmark greeting card store, which are located a shopping center in North Colony Road - weren't supposed to reopen until town officials had certified that snow had been removed from the roof that the retailers jointly share. But somehow the full details of that message didn't get to the management of the stores, who kept the businesses open on Saturday and most of Sunday, according to Code Inspector Peter LeClerc.

LeClerc had closed the stores and a neighboring Shop Rite on Thursday amid concerns about the weight of snow on their roofs. Shop Rite cleared its roof and was reopened for business on Friday.

The same thing was supposed to happen at the other four stores, but didn't. So LeClerc was back at the shopping center on Sunday to shut the four stores down a second time.

"The stores were open without authorization," LeClerc said. "They were told that to reopen, they had to remove the snow."

All four stores were open for business on Monday, this time with authorization from the town after having removed the snow.